An estimated 4 million workers in the U.S. are struggling to work due to debilitating symptoms from long COVID. The government is urging employers to provide accommodations to keep them on the job.

With variants increasingly changing and becoming more transmissible, people who remain unvaccinated — even if they already had COVID-19 — are at risk of developing long COVID.

Some scientists estimate that cases of long COVID from omicron will still rise, however, because of high transmissibility and the misconception that people don't have to worry about catching it.

The first results from an in-depth investigation of long COVID produced provocative results. Researchers don't understand the mechanism behind the lingering symptoms but found a link with anxiety.

Researchers found that people who had COVID-19 were about 40% more likely to develop diabetes within a year after recovering, compared to participants in a control group.

Though findings are preliminary, many studies suggest that vaccinated people have good protection against the condition, although just how much is still up for debate.

Even if you don't have long COVID, it can still take weeks to recover — much longer than the isolation period implies. Millions of Americans are finding that this still majorly disrupts their lives.

Writer Meghan O'Rourke says long COVID-19 and other chronic illnesses put a heavy burden on patients, who have to "testify to the reality of their own illness." Her new book is The Invisible Kingdom.

As the worst of the omicron surge fades around the country, health officials worry more Americans may end up with long COVID. The condition affects roughly one-third of COVID-19 survivors. For this episode, we hear from a Georgia mother of two who is living with long COVID.

The virus that causes COVID-19 can cause strokes, inflammation, oxygen deprivation and infection in the brain. And each of these may lead to long-term neurological problems.

One of the surprising aspects of the pandemic is that symptoms can linger months after infection. This syndrome has been called "long COVID," and it's had a profound impact on many people's lives.

Scientists have begun to find abnormalities in the immune systems of some long-COVID patients that might help explain the syndrome, at least in some people. But there is still much more to learn.

The symptoms, such as headache, fatigue and cognitive dysfunction, persist or recur months after diagnosis, far more often than they do for the flu, researchers say.